Without a Backwards Glance
by xoxJENxox
Summary: A mysterious new student has joined Hogwarts in her fourth year. A pretty, polite girl she immediatly catches the interest of more than one of the guys, but there's something strange about her and Harry is determined to find out what it is... Slightly AU
1. Without a Backwards Glance

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, or any of the characters therin, etc, etc.

"Hufflepuff!" The sorting hat bellowed. A small girl with blonde pig-tails hopped off the stool and ran to the Hufflepuff table, amid loud cheers.

Ron groaned "when will it end?" he rolled his eyes at Harry, who grinned. Hermione poked Ron in the ribs "Ouch! Watcha' do that for?" he rubbed his side plaintively. Hermione sniffed. "Well, I just thought that you might want to listen, professor McGonagall is about to say something." Harry and Ron looked around and indeed, professor McGonagall was standing next to the stool with the sorting hat on it, waving for attention.

"I have an important announcement to make!" The hall fell silent as everyone turned to look at her. "As well as the students joining the first year, we have, most unusually, a student joining the fourth year. She will be sorted, as any other student, and I hope you will treat her well, whichever house she joins."

Ron poked harry in the ribs "Hey, she s in our year! Wow she looks about twenty, I thought she was a new teacher." Ron whistled and Hermione poked him again "Ouch! Okay, okay. She s hideous. Jeez... some people..." He trailed off menacingly but Hermione seemed happier.

Harry was looking up at the front table, where the girl was standing next to professor McGonagall. He didn t know what Ron saw in her. That is if he even did, Harry suspected that he was just trying to annoy Hermione. The girl s dirty blonde hair flopped in front of her eyes and spilled over her shoulders. She was tall though, and had piercing green eyes, like a cat's. There was an unusual... presence about her. She sat down on the stool and put on the sorting hat. Rather than falling down over her eyes, it just flopped back a bit.

"God, she s got a big head."Muttered Ron "reminds me of someone el-" He broke off under Hermione s stern gaze.

"Gryffindor!"

The girl stood up to polite applause and Ron turned his attention to the food. "All right!" he started shovelling roast chicken and potatoes onto his plate.

Hermione looked disapproving as she demurely served herself, and Harry started tucking into a large helping of shepherd's pie. Just as he was pouring himself a glass of pumpkin juice, he heard a voice right behind him.

"Excuse me, is anyone sitting here?" it was the girl who had just been sorted. She was pointing to the seat next to Harry's, which was empty.

"Nope! It's all yours." Ron said loudly, ignoring Hermione, who was glaring at him. "Sit down." the girl smiled and took a seat.

"I'm Ron Weasley, this is Hermione Granger and, Harry Potter." the girls eyes lit up.

"Seriously, is that your name!"

Harry was just about to reply when the girl continued "-my sisters name is Hermione too! I m Jenni, by the way." Hermione beamed and offered her a plate of chicken.

"Nice to meet you Jenni. I m sure you re keen to get started with your lessons?" Ron smirked, but Jenni looked delighted "Oh absolutely!" she gushed "I can't wait to get started; there s so much to learn! I ve already mastered the basics of course, but that s just from reading, I m sure I'd learn much faster if there was someone who I could ask questions."

She sounded so much like Hermione that it was all Harry could do to stop himself laughing. Deciding that the wisest move would be to change the subject he asked "So why are you joining the fourth year? Did you get moved up or something?"

Jenni dragged herself reluctantly away from Hermione to answer, "I m your age; I should have started three years ago. But I well- actually I was in hospital. I got- anyway, I couldn t come."

She suddenly looked extremely uncomfortable, and Harry immensely regretted his rash remark. There was an awkward silence for quite a while, until pudding arrived, then Ron started chatting to Dean Thomas about Quidditch. Harry still felt as though Jenni was concerned and was about to say something when professor Dumbledore stood up to signal the end of the meal. Everyone started to make their way up to their dormitories.

"See you tomorrow!" he called after Jenni, as she ascended the spiral stairs with Hermione, but she didn t reply.

* * *

The next day Harry hardly saw Hermione or Jenni at all, he and Ron where so busy trying to get to grips with all their work. Their brains seemed to have frozen up over the summer holidays and they couldn t remember a thing. Hermione finally caught up with them at lunch.

"Honestly!" she sat down next to Ron "Professor Vector has given me so much homework, its ridiculous!"

"Well, if you didn t want to get homework you should have taken less subjects, Harry and I haven t got any at all. Anyway, where s Jenni, I wanted her to help me with my charms."

"I thought you said you hadn t got any homework?" Hermione sounded annoyed, "Anyway, what s wrong with my help?"

Harry, anxious to avoid conflict addressed Hermione. "How s Jenni getting on? I mean, she must be finding it really hard to cope, we're all three years ahead of her after all."

Hermione looked around to check that no-one was listening before leaning in closer and saying, "actually, that s what I wanted to talk to you about. There s something funny. She s just- too good." Ron looked sceptical.

"Look, Hermione, we all know that you're really clever and were not going to stop thinking that but it sounds like you might be a tiny bit jealous of Jenni."

"I am not jealous! I just think there s something going on. When we were in transfiguration this afternoon, I saw her drop her wand. But instead of picking it up, she just pointed at it and it was in her hand! She didn t say anything. She didn t realise anyone was watching, and she looked really shifty afterwards."

"Maybe she didn t want people to think she was clumsy." said Ron, shrugging. Hermione was furious, "that s highly advanced and unusual magic! She could be working for you-know-who!" Ron rolled his eyes. "Come on Hermione, just because she s good at magic, you think she must be working for the dark side. It s not exactly one of you-know-who's requirements, I mean, look at worm tail, you couldn t find a more talentless git if you tried!" Hermione snorted and looked away from Ron.

Harry thought about it for a moment, was it really likely? Nah, Hermione was probably just paranoid. He was just opening his mouth to say this when Hermione said, in an uncharacteristically cheery voice, "Hello Jenni! Did you find those books you wanted then?" Jenni flopped down next to Harry, a large pile of books in front of her.

"Yeah, thanks for your help Hermione."

"Oh, it was nothing." Hermione looked slightly flustered. Just as Harry finished the final bite of his sandwich, the bell rang to signal the end of lunch.

"Hey Harry, we've got a free next, so why don't we go down to the quidditch pitch. You can bring your Firebolt." Harry nodded, "lets go." They were just getting up when Jenni looked up from her lunch.

"Oh, can I come too! I d love to see more of the grounds!" Harry looked at Ron, who shrugged. "Yeah, sure."

As they were leaving the entrance hall to go down to the quidditch pitch, a loud sneering voice behind Harry said,

"Potter, I see you've found yourself a new girlfriend. The rich and famous must try to keep with the times. I ve always thought that you made a mistake with that ridiculous Granger girl."

It was, unsurprisingly, Draco Malfoy, flanked as he always was by Crabbe and Goyle. Harry didn t turn around, and neither did Ron or Jenni.

"Dear, dear, potter. Is your hearing really that bad? Goodness, I can just see the headlines 'Harry Potter defeats dark lord with hearing aid."' the note of sarcasm in his voice was unmistakable.

Harry bristled but did his best to ignore Malfoy's jibes. Malfoy, visibly annoyed, poked Jenni hard in the back. "Hey, so you're th-" He stopped mid-sentence, which was unsurprising as Jenni had turned and punched him full in the face.

"Don't you dare touch me!" She hissed. Harry and Ron where taken aback, this transformation was nothing to say unexpected. The unusual feeling that surrounded her seemed intensified and Harry could have sworn he could see sparks shooting from her fingers. Harry's surprise however, was nothing to Draco Malfoy s. He staggered backwards, his mouth hanging open, just staring at Jenni. After a moment he seemed to recover himself and his usual sneer returned to his face.

"God potter, I can see that you'll have your hands full with this one. Honestly, I don t know where you get them from! First that filthy mud blood and now this freak." Jenni was positively fuming by this time and it was all Harry and Ron could do to stop her jumping on Malfoy. Her blonde hair was whipping around her head as if in a high wind. Malfoy, seemingly unaware of Jenni's fury, continued to smirk.

"Well, I wish you luck Potter, maybe you'll do better this time. Oh and my father told me that Weasley's dad is in trouble with the ministry again, by the way."

Ron let go of Jenni to punch Malfoy and she struggled out of Harry's grasp. She walked forward and waved her arm at Malfoy as if to slap him. Thin green tendrils shot towards Malfoy from her fingers and wrapped around his ankles. Crabbe and Goyle staggered back as the shoots tried to reach them too.

"JENNI!" Hermione was running towards them. She screeched to a halt as she saw Malfoy, literally rooted to the spot. She shook Jenni roughly by the shoulders.

"Snap out of it!" Jenni s eyes focused again and she waved her hand. The tendrils crumbled into dust and then vanished. No sooner had this happened than Malfoy, Crabbe and Goyle had run away, hardly daring to look back.

"How the hell did you do that without a wand!" shouted Ron, who was almost as shocked as Malfoy had been. Jenni turned to him and shook her sleeve. Her wand fell out and she caught it with her other hand. "I speak quietly." she said. Then she turned to Harry. "You know what, I don t quite fancy that game of quidditch now. See you in charms." And she walked off, without a backwards glance.

* * *

Thank you for reading! Please reveiw!


	2. An Unfortunate Mistake

AN: I do not own Harry Potter.

Charms was a subdued affair, to say the least. For a start, professor Flitwick set them off straight away learning a new charm to temporarily enable an object to fly, similar to the charms placed on broomsticks, but on a much smaller scale. It was unbelievably difficult, even Hermione was having some trouble and as a result everyone was focusing as much as they could. Harry was grateful for the excuse to ignore Jenni, who had seriously freaked him out with her attack on Malfoy. Perhaps he was just a tiny bit admiring of her standing up to the Slytherin, but he would never admit that, even to himself.

He snuck a glance at her at the front of the classroom where she was chatting shyly to Lavender and Parvati, giving them tips on how best to cast the charm. She seemed to have mastered it already. When Flitwick came over to see how Jenni was getting on she flicked her wand pointedly at the button her desk and it zoomed around the room for several minutes before she muttered the counter charm and it came to rest in her hand.

"Excellent!" Squeaked professor Flitwick, turning to the class "See! Miss. er-"

"Yousei." Jenni muttered.

"Miss. Yousei's done it! quite brilliant! Ten points to Gryphinndor." He announced before turning back to Jenni. "Did you learn that at your old school? Professor Dumbledore never mentioned anything but that flair reminds me of Beauxbatons students I have met in the past. You know, you distinctly remind me of a girl I taught many years ago, a Miss. Everidge? Of course that was a bit before your time. She had quite a talent for charms if I remember, of course she was in my house, but we're getting a very high standard of Gryffindor these days too- MR. LONGBOTTOM! KINDLY REMOVE YOUR WAND FROM MR. THOMAS' EYE!" He bustled away down to the other side of the class room.

Harry saw Lavender looking admiringly at Jenni.

"Jenni could you help me with something?"

"What is it, Lavender?"

"Well... could you show me how you get your hair so straight?"

* * *

The next day dawned bright and early and after the post had been opened and a light breakfast of toast and jam had been consumed, Harry, Ron and Hermione were walking across the grounds towards the greenhouses for their first lesson; Herbology. When they entered they saw Jenni was already there and talking to Professor Sprout. Harry felt a twinge of annoyance at this, though he couldn t think why. Whatever Jenni did, it just seemed to get to him. he sat down and a moment later Jenni sat next to him. He clenched his teeth and was just biting back a scathing remark when professor Sprout clapped her hands.

"Right chaps! today we're going to be looking at something very unusual." She reached into the bucket in front of her and pulled out a round fruit, a little like tomato. However, unlike a tomato it had large pulsing blue veins criss-crossing all over it and smelled faintly of warm cabbage.

"Now," professor Sprout puffed, "can anybody tell me what this is?" Hermione's hand shot into the air, but it was superseded, although only slightly, by Jenni's.

"Ah, yes. Ms. Yousei, isn t it? what do you think this is?"

"its a Pulchra-nona seed, professor." Their was not a scrap of hesitation in her voice, yet she sounded somehow... different. Then suddenly Harry realised what it was. Although Jenni was always first to volunteer information, she never seemed to actually enjoy the lessons, but now she sat on the mud-encrusted bench, beaming as professor sprout showed them the best way to peel the funny-looking seeds. It struck Harry as odd, that through the layers of keen determination, this seemed to be the first lesson that she'd genuinely enjoyed. It brought Harry's mind back once again to that never-ending circle. Just what was she doing here?

"Mr. Potter! are you listening to me?" Harry looked up with a jolt as he realised that professor Sprout had been talking to him. "Honestly Potter." She scolded, "you need to pay attention. Very dangerous, Pulchra-nona peeling. Now as I was saying, you will all take one of these bowls and put the peeled flesh into it, and don t forget to wear your gloves!" Harry absentmindedly grabbed a bowl and began to peel one of the ugly plants.

It was tricky, to say the least, as the skins of the plants were incredibly thick and unyielding to even the sharpest knife. After a while however, Harry managed to get into a rhythm and the lesson passed quickly and without fuss.

* * *

On the way to Transfiguration, Harry was accosted by Ginny and Luna. "Hi Harry." Luna said dreamily, gazing at the ceiling. "Did you know that there s a Tripolope hanging just above your head?"

Harry resisted the urge to look up and smiled instead, "Hey Luna! How are you?"

"Fine."

Harry then turned to Ginny and smiled. "So, how are you? Ron told me you were going out with a fifth year, Ted or Bob, or something." Ginny bristled.

"Well that just shows what he knows! I am not going out with ANYONE, no matter what Ron says!" She pointedly ignored Ron, who was standing next to Luna and addressed her remark solely at Harry, who smiled sympathetically and shrugged.

"So, how's the third year treating you? Lots of homework I should hope."

Ginny rolled her eyes. "You bet. Prof-"

Suddenly there was a loud crash and Harry saw that the strap of Ginny's bag had snapped and it had fallen to the floor, books and parchment spilling out from it. Luna, Ron and Ginny all leaned down to try and gather up the stuff and Harry was about to when he felt a prickling sensation in the back of his neck and turned to look in the direction Ginny had been facing. There was no-one there but something compelled him to have a closer look. There was a bust of some old wizard balanced precariously on a pedestal by a door to what Harry presumed was a classroom, but had never really noticed before. He leaned down and something caught his eye. Trapped in the door-frame was a single, long, silvery-blonde hair.

The bell rang out to signal the start of another lesson and they all rushed off to wherever they were going. Harry managed to arrive in the Transfiguration classroom just as McGonagall was about to enter and swiftly took a place between Ron and Hermione. They set about organising their books and parchments, then turned to the front, where the professor was writing their assignment on the board. It was a continuation from their last lesson which had been full of complex magical theory that Harry had hardly understood a word of. This lesson was the practical, and Harry was not looking forward to it, as he could hardly remember what the spell was supposed to do, never mind how to cast it.

"Now, who can tell me what the purpose of this spell is?"

Hermione's and Jenni's hands fought to get into the air first, followed more slowly by a few other people in the class who were good at transfiguration.

"Miss. Granger?" Hermione beamed at professor McGonagall and said with her usual accuracy "The Silvacidere charm is used to transform a natural element such as wood into a product made from that substance. For instance, in Albania-"

"Excellent Miss. Granger. Now class, you will see in front of each of you is a small block of wood. I want you to take this and, referring to the extensive notes that you made yesterday, attempt to transform it into a button, like this."

She flicked her wand at the small, mossy piece of wood in front of her and it vanished, to be replaced instantly by a varnished wooden button, engraved with roses. "I do not expect anyone to get it right straight away, of course."

Harry rolled his eyes. She may not expect it, but he felt sure that Jenni would have no trouble mastering the spell.

It was ten minutes later and so far no-one had even attempted to cast the spell, all were re-reading their notes and waiting for some-one else to try first. Finally there was a scraping sound and Harry saw Jenni get to her feet. All eyes were fixed on her, although most people were holding up textbooks to try and look as though they were reading. She rolled up her sleeves, cleared her throat and pointed her wand at the lump of bark and wood. "Silvacidere!" There was a moment of silence and then suddenly her desk was a blur. Then Harry heard gasps and looked up.

The classroom had been transformed. A tree trunk, nearly three feet thick was sprouting from the centre of Jenni's desk. The legs had extended across the room like roots and the ceiling was obscured by thick, leafy branches. In the centre of it all was Jenni looking shocked and holding her wand as though it might go off. For a moment everyone was too stunned to speak and could only stare, open-mouthed at their surroundings. Then McGonagall opened her mouth and everyone turned to look at her. "I think it best th-" She began, but was interrupted by a branch falling from the tree and landing not a foot from her. She frowned.

"Class dismissed."

Still sneaking looks at the tree as though it would somehow disappear if they couldn't see it, the class traipsed out of the door and into the corridor. Most of them disappeared off towards the great hall, but Harry turned to Jenni, who was still looking stunned. He was still in shock himself, and was going to ask her if she was okay when he remebered the incedent with Ginny's bag that morning and he snapped. "What the hell was that, Jenni? First you curse Draco Malfoy, not that I care about him, but it was just weird. Then you screw up that spell, when everyone knows that you can do it. What's your problem! It's like all you want is attention! It s no wonder you have to hang around Hermione all the time, it s not as if anyone likes you!"

Jenni's face darkened and Harry immediatly regretted his rash remark. He hadn't meant to say that at all, he would never be that rude usually, it was just so strange the way she acted and he had to know why. It wasn't true anyway, Lavender and Parvati seemed to like her, and he hadn't managed the spell at all. He had been about to ask her if she was okay, but then all the things he had been thinking just spilled out. Surely she would understand that he was just being stupid. He had to say something, anything to explain to her that he didn't mean it. He felt like such an idiot, she would be devastated, or worse- he thought of her punching Malfoy- furious. "Harry _Potter_." She said, venom crowded into every syllable. "_You_-" but she was interrupted by a shout from behind them.

"Miss. Yousei." McGonagall called from the classroom, which was now forest-free, although there were leaves in her hair. "Come here please, I want a word." And then Jenni was gone, and Harry was alone in the corridor with nothing but his guilt for what he had said, and an over-full schoolbag stuffed with parchment and books.

* * *

After lunch was Potions and Jenni was conspicious only by her absence. Harry looked meaningfully at Ron. Surely she wouldn't get in _trouble_? I mean it was obviously an accident and after all, turning a desk back into a tree was a very impressive piece of magic that most teachers probably couldn't do, as Hermione had told them both several times during lunch. The rest of the class evidently thought the same thing. Then, why wasn't she in Potions? She hadn't been injured in any way, Harry felt sure of that. It was all rather peculiar. Harry thought of Jenni's face when he had yelled at her and gulped. God that was a stupid thing to do, he thought, but she can't be that _sad_, right? I mean, she looked like she was going to kill me... "Mr. Potter!" Harry looked up at Snape, who was standing right over him, his greasy black hair hanging down in front of his sallow face.

"Kindly tell the class what I just said."

"Umm... I-"

"Evidently you were not listening! Of course, I would have thought that a person of your very limited talent would have had to pay attention in order to pass potions, perhaps you disagree with me? Well?"

Harry remained silent.

"Twenty points from Gryffindor! Mr. Malfoy, Perhaps you can tell us."

* * *

Jenni returned to the common room in the evening looking so, well normal, that many of the fourth years doubted whether what they had seen was really true. She sat down on the sofa next to Hermione and pulled out a quill and parchment from her bag.

"How long was the charms meant to be?"

"One foot and five inches."

"Oh, cool."

And just like that, it was as if nothing had ever happened. Which, Harry reflected, it hadn't really. I mean, it wasn't the first time there had been a magical accident at Hogwarts. They happened all the time. So much so that most people got used to them, even expected strange things to happen. She even appeared to have completely forgotten their argument. He supposed he had, in his own mind, blown it all out of proportion, when in reality it was nothing at all except an unfortunate mistake.

* * *

Reveiws:

shigeki11: Thanks for the comments! I have spaced it out more now, so I hope that it will be easier to read and thank you for reviewing.

:) : Have now added more -s to make time periods clearer. Thank you very much for your positive feedback, I'll definitely keep writing!

domenica13: Thank you! *Gives out chocolate bar*

JJ: Wow! I can see that you've really read it and I so appreciate you taking time to help me improve my writing. I hope I have fixed all of the typographical errors that you pointed out and I think that the beta-reader idea is an excellent one. I've also changed the quotation marks around the speech to speech marks, as I think your quite right when you say it makes it clearer. Again thank you so much for your feedback, as it has been incredibly helpful. Oh, and is anyone interested in being my Beta-Reader? Anyone?

xox Midnight Starz xox: Thank you! I hope you like chapter two!

Thank you for reading! Please Reveiw!


	3. A Peculiar Prediction

AN: I don't own Harry Potter

Harry woke up feeling warm and vaguely annoyed with the world for the fact that he had to get up. Ah well, there was Quidditch practice that evening; the first since term had started, so that was all right. He got up, brushed his teeth and then poked Ron on the shoulder to see if he was awake.

"W'ch do th fo?" Ron mumbled and blearily opened his eyes.

"Aren't you going to get up then?" Harry asked.

"No. I think I'm dying." Ron coughed dramatically. Harry grinned. "Then I suppose that in your delicate condition you won't be able to eat any breakfast?" Ron grinned too. "Oh would you look at that! I appear to have made a miraculous recovery." He jumped out of bed, pulled on his robes and started running down the spiral staircase to the common room. As he reached the bottom he yelled over his shoulder, "Last one down to breakfast is rotten hippogriff egg!"

Harry and Ron arrived at the Gryffindor table tired and out of breath and collapsed next to Hermione and Jenni, who looked at them from over their cornflakes with identical expressions of mild disapproval. "Morning!" Ron said brightly. Harry served himself some porridge from a silver tureen and was just settling down to his breakfast when the post arrived.

A flock of owls swooped low towards the Gryffindor table and Harry was glad to see that Hedwig was among them. She fluttered down onto the table and nibbled Harry's fingers affectionately as he detached two letters from her leg.

"Who are they from?" Asked Hermione, craning her neck to get a better look. The first was a slightly grubby envelope addressed to "Harry Potter" in the unmistakable handwriting of Rubeus Hagrid. Harry opened it, scanned it quickly then passed it to Ron saying, "He says he knows that there's nothing special happening tomorrow afternoon, so why don't we pop over to visit him at about three-ish."

Hermione nodded. "That's nice; I haven't seen Hagrid since the first day of term."

Jenni paused in her eating and said "Who's Hagrid?"

"Keeper of keys and grounds at Hogwarts would be his technical title." Hermione said, "But really he does everything that needs to be done around here, and he's a good friend of Dumbledore's. You can't miss him; he's about seven foot tall with a big beard."

Jenni nodded "Oh right. I've seen him around the forest, with the biggest dog I have ever seen."

"That's Hagrid all right," Hermione said "the dog's name is Fang. He looks scary but he's all ri-"

She was interrupted by a curse from Ron, who had been helping Harry to remove copious amounts of spell-o-tape from the large white envelope that Hedwig had brought him. Ron had slashed at the tape with his butter knife and it had opened, spilling about a jug's worth of water all down the front of his robes. Some had splashed onto Harry as well and Hermione passed them a pile of linen napkins. She tried to help Ron dry up some of the water using her wand, but he waved her away. "Look, it's already gone." He said. And indeed it had been absorbed almost instantly into the fabric of Ron's robes and into his hands.

"How strange." Hermione looked at Harry, "who would send you something like that?"

"Draco Malfoy, probably," said Harry unconcernedly, "I got one just like it yesterday, and the day before. Probably his idea of a joke." He sighed. "I'll make sure to throw the next one in the lake. Sorry Ron."

Ron was frowning deeply and seemed unusually put out. "You'd better be sorry." He muttered. "My mum would kill me if I ruined my school robes."

Before Harry or Hermione could reply to this rather unusual outburst the bell rang for the start of lessons and Harry jumped to his feet. "Damn, we're going to be seriously late for divination." Hermione and Jenni began to gather up their books but Ron still looked sulky. "Who cares if we're late for divination? It's only stupid Trelawney anyway."

Harry ignored him, grabbed Ron's bag from where it lay on the floor, and followed the rest of the fourth year Gryffindors who were heading out of the great hall and towards the North Tower.

* * *

Ron's sulk persisted throughout the double divination lesson, and was not helped by Professor Trelawney's many allusions to "a troubled man with red hair." whenever she examined one of the students tea-cups.

The class had been divided into groups of three and Parvati and Lavender had jumped at the chance to show off their supposed prowess at divination to the new student, asking Jenni to work with them. Harry had carefully positioned himself on the far side of a large chintz sofa to where Trelawney was standing, so as to minimize her attention towards him and ensure that if she wanted to look at his work she would have to go past Lavender and Parvati, which should allow him ample time to move to another part of the room.

Trelawney did indeed stop to help Lavender, Jenni and Parvati and Harry heard her say, in her usual misty voice accompanied by the clink of her jewelery. "A new student, I see. I am professor Trelawney, descended from the great Cassandra Trelawney, you know. Well, perhaps not. Ah! What is this?" She took the teacup from Jenni's outstretched hand and looked closely at the lump of leaves in the bottom. "It seems that you have a great burden my dear. You have perhaps sustained a great injury in recent times? And here, oh! But I must not say!" Half the class looked on with interest while the other half, used to Trelawney's gloomy prediction, ignored her and continued to chat about the up-coming Quidditch match between Gryffindor and Ravenclaw. Unhindered, Trelawney drew a deep breath and continued, "You will suffer a near fatal accident at the hands of someone who you thought you could trust, but who you have already betrayed. You will break someone's arm by accident and you will have to make a decision that will decide the life or death of one, and the happiness of many." She looked down at Jenni with baleful eyes, hugely magnified by her spectacles.

Harry snorted derisively and peered over the arm of the sofa to see how Jenni would react. He expected her to look incredulous, surprised or even annoyed, but he met her gaze and for a split second her face was filled with a look of such sheer terror that Harry dropped his teacup in surprise. It shattered loudly and squelchily and Trelawney sighed and said without turning around. "Ah. Mr. Potter, we meet again."

* * *

It was the end of the day, and as Harry ploughed his way through a veritable mountain of homework, his only comfort was the thought of seven o' clock, and Quidditch practice. Hermione had already completed all of her homework and Ron was as usual putting off doing his, so the two of them were engaged in a heated game of chess, which Ron was winning. Harry stretched and rubbed his wrist, then looked down at the half-completed star-chart that was due in for Wednesday's astronomy lesson. He glanced around the common room and saw Jenni, Parvati and Lavender engaged in animated conversation over a selection of glossy "Miss. Witch" magazines. It seemed that Lavender was enumerating at great length on the various qualities and merits of different hair-potions, while Parvati and Jenni listened attentively. Harry decided to do his homework later, packed up his books and went up to the dormitories to fetch his Firebolt.

* * *

Quidditch practice went well, although most of the team were a bit rusty after the summer holidays. Wood had of course come up with a whole host of new tactics which he managed to explain to the team, despite the Weasley twin's loudly exaggerated yawns. After a while though, they got into their stride and Harry managed to catch most of the ping-pong balls that Wood lobbed at him, as the snitch would be easy to lose in the dusk. After an hour of hard practice the whole team was exhausted and Wood had scheduled the rest of the practices for that term. Harry saw a small group of Gryffindors approaching from the direction of the castle. Ron was among them and ran over to see what they were up to.

"Hey Harry!" Ron called. "How about a quick two-a-side game?" Ron's good humour seemed to have returned and he looked quite cheerful, but Harry was exhausted. "Nah, I'm starving."

Ron's' smile widened. "Can I have a go on your Firebolt, then?" Harry nodded and looked at the other people who were there.

Hermione was reading a thick book and looked as though she had been reluctant to leave the common room. Lavender and Parvati were also there, they seemed to have been heading for the castle but been distracted and had come over to have a look. With them was Jenni. Harry smiled at her. "Have you come to have a go too?" He asked, jerking a thumb over his shoulder at Ron, who was racing the twins up and down the pitch. Parvati and Lavender looked disdainfully at him, as though they were shocked that Harry would suggest such a thing, but Jenni nodded. "All right then." She said. "How about a race? Maybe we can borrow another broom from someone else on the team." Harry raised his eyebrows but said "Sure. Ron should be back in a second. I can use Fred's broom"

A few minutes later Harry and Jenni were standing next to each other at one edge of the pitch, with Lavender, Parvati, Ron, Hermione and George standing on the sidelines. Fred had been appointed referee and seemed to be thoroughly enjoying himself. "Right," he said, "the rules are simple. You fly to the other end of the pitch; you touch a goal post and then you fly back. First to cross this line," He flicked his wand and a glowing white line appeared on the ground "is the winner. Clear? Right then. On your marks, get set, Go!"

Harry kicked of from the ground and sped across the pitch, jolting slightly as he got used to the broom that Fred had lent him. It was no Firebolt, that was for sure, but it was fairly speedy and he was in the lead. He glanced back to see Jenni accelerating towards him, clinging on to the broom as if for dear life. Perhaps this race hadn't been such a good idea after all. In fact, Harry hadn't even asked Jenni if she could fly. Maybe she had just been joking, and then was too shy to say anything when Harry took her seriously. She hadn't seemed to be joking, but then she was not an easy person to read. Harry was nearly at the other end of the pitch when he head a shriek from behind him and turned to see Jenni dangling underneath the broom, holding on tight with both hands as the Fire bolt accelerated straight towards the goal-posts.

Harry sped back after her, willing the broom to pick up speed, but really he had no idea what he could do. Jenni was past the goal now, and heading towards the stands at tremendous speed. "Turn around!" Harry bellowed, but it was no good. Jenni had lost control of the broom and it looked as though it was going to crash. Badly. For one second he thought about the shape his Firebolt was likely to end up in and winced, then berated himself. Jenni was more important. If she smashed into a million pieces, there was no Quality Quidditch Supplies shop where he could buy a new one.

Finally, just when he thought that it was all over, he caught up with her and managed to wrench and Firebolt from her grasp. She dropped the six or so feet to the ground and landed in a hedge. He over-balanced and landed next to her, clutching both of the brooms and gasping for breath. Lavender and Ron ran over to them as Harry gasped "Are you all right?" Jenni nodded numbly and got to her feet. "You?"

"I think my arm's broken. But Madam Pomfrey will fix it in a second."

Lavender took off her own cloak and wrapped it around Jenni's shoulders, while Ron stood next to Harry, trying to suppress a laugh. "Smooth mate." he chuckled. "I only wish that you could have seen it. The look on your face. Priceless." He turned to Jenni and stopped smirking "You okay?" She nodded again and Ron turned back to Harry. "Excellent!" He rubbed his hands together "Let's head back shall we?" But Harry was not so cheerful. It wasn't the pain in his arm that was the problem; he was used to Quidditch accidents. He had just remembered Professor Trelawney's prediction, and suddenly it didn't seem so funny any more.

* * *

Reviews:

Seffi: I have corrected the mis-spelling of Gryffindor, thank you for pointing it out.

michi-nin: I'll do my best to update again soon, sorry for the wait!

Jen: Thank you for your detailed feedback, all of which was very helpful. I hope you feel that the slight changes I have made make the fanfic more accurate to the period of the books in which it is set.

:): Thank you, and if you want to find out what happens with McGonagall I suggest you keep reading! XD.

Thank you for reading! Please reveiw!


	4. A Jar of Bowtruckles

AN: In this fanfic, as I am not using the "Goblet of Fire" tri-wizard tournament plotline, I have decided that Proffessor Moody will not be the defense against the dark arts teacher. Instead, proffessor Lupin has remained in his post, because proffessor Snape didn't tell everyone that he is a werewolf, therefore there is no reason why he would have to go. He doesn't feature much in this fanfic but I wanted to make it clear that yes, this is set in the fourth year, but there is no tri-wizard tournament.

* * *

It was nearly nine thirty by the time Harry got out of the hospital wing. It was only a minor fracture and madam Pomfrey mended with a single wave of her wand, but she had insisted on checking over Harry several times before letting him go. She seemed particularly despondent that he had got into yet another accident and, as he was leaving, she had thrust into his arms several pamphlets encouraging safety in Quidditch. Jenni, despite having some pretty nasty scratches and a big cut across her forehead, had declined to go to Madam Pomfrey and had in fact looked almost scared at the suggestion. She had gone straight up to the dormitories and, according to Hermione, had disappeared behind the hangings of her four-poster bed and instantly fallen asleep.

Harry arrived at dinner just as the puddings appeared on their silver platters and ate a meal consisting of a large amount of fruit salad, treacle tart and vanilla ice-cream, washed down with a whole jug of iced pumpkin juice. By the time he had climbed through the portrait hole, made his way through the crowds of people milling around the common room and climbed the spiral steps to the dormitories, he was ready to fall asleep instantly. All thoughts of the day vanished from his mind and by the time his head hit the pillow he was already fast asleep.

* * *

From the diary of Lavender Brown:

17 September, 1994 - 10.30, History of Magic

If you ask me, I think that Harry has got some serious problems. I mean, he's always been a bit odd but he hasn't exactly had a normal life, so you'd expect that, I guess. Lately though, he's been pretty stressed out. I overheard Hermione Granger talking to Ron about it the other day, and Jenni, the new girl, said that Harry had been really horrible to her ever since she started at Hogwarts. Take this morning, for instance. Parvati, Jen and I were waiting outside the charms classroom when Harry turned up, with Ron and Hermione Granger. Well, yesterday evening Jenni got pretty badly shaken when Harry's broom threw her off during that race that he forced her into, so I figured that she wouldn't be overly thrilled to see him. I suggested that we move down the corridor to wait for Professor Flitwick and we were just going when all of a sudden, Harry leaned over and grabbed Jenni's wrist. She looked terrified of course, poor dear, but he didn't even seem to notice. He just glared at her and said, "I'm glad to see that you went to Madam Pomfrey after all, I was worried about that cut on your forehead."

Now I know that doesn't sound too bad, but it was the way he said it. Really accusing, like just because he had to get his arm healed in the hospital wing, she should have gone as well. But it was weird, because she hadn't gone to the Hospital wing at all. She put a bandage on the cut herself as soon as she could and it must have been just a little scratch. I mean, I didn't actually see it properly, because that would be gross, but if it healed over night it must have been fine. Plus, Jen was probably wearing a load of makeup, to have skin that looks that perfect. Well, I didn't really care to tell you the truth. I wouldn't have thought that anyone would.

Jen said, "Oh, I didn't go to the Hospital wing. It wasn't a bad cut really." And that should have been the end of it. Except, of course, Harry Potter, the nosiest boy on the planet, was determined to work out exactly why she was all right. He was about to say something else when Professor Flitwick arrived, and everyone went into the classroom. Later I asked Jen if she was all right, and she said she was fine, but all through the lesson I saw her doodling in her notebook and when Professor Flitwick called her up to the front to demonstrate a new charm, I looked at what she had been drawing. Then I knew for sure that there was something weird going on.

* * *

That afternoon Parvati and Lavender were attending their extra divination lessons with Professor Trelawney, who had hinted that they might be able to take their O.W.L early, so Jenni was at a loose end. She was walking past the great hall when she saw the familiar bushy head of Hermione granger disappearing out of the main doors. She hurried to catch up and had just tapped Hermione on the shoulder when she noticed Harry and Ron walking towards them. Oh well, too late now. "Hello Jenni." Said Hermione in surprise, looking around her. "Where are Parvati and Lavender?" Jenni shrugged.

"Divination. Where are you off to?"

"Oh, we're going to see Hagrid." She motioned to Ron and Harry. "Would you like to come?"

Jenni hesitated and then said, "Sure. Why not."

The four made their way across the grounds to Hagrid's hut in silence, which Harry suspected was just a bit more awkward for Jenni being there. He was relieved when they finally arrived and he knocked on the large door. There was a loud barking, scratching sound and then Hagrid's yells of "Down, fang, down!" and then "Oo's there?"

"It's us, Hagrid." Harry yelled over the sound of Fang's whining, and almost instantly the door flew open. There was Hagrid, one huge hand restraining Fang while the other reached out to pat Harry on the back. "Harry! Ron! And 'ermione too, 'o course. 'Ow are you?" He ushered them inside and then noticed Jenni, who had been hanging back slightly, looking at Fang in alarm. "Are you going t' introduce yer friend 'ere then Harry?"

Harry turned and looked at Jenni in some surprise, as though he had almost forgotten she was there, and then he seemed to remember himself and said, "Of course. Hagrid, this is Jenni Yousei. Jenni, this is Rubeus Hagrid."

Hagrid held out a dustbin-lid sized hand to shake Jenni's, who only winced a tiny bit when Hagrid crushed her fingers in his elephantine grip. "Pleasure t' meet ye. Any friend o' Harry is a friend o' mine, eh?"

Jenni smiled and Hagrid ushered them into his tiny cottage, then set about making tea over the fire. Harry, Ron and Hermione say down on the wooden chairs around the table and Jenni, after a momentary look of un-ease, joined them. Hagrid put the kettle on the stove and then rummaged around in the cupboard for a milk jug, asking as he did so, "'Ow 'ave you been, then? No problems with your scar Harry?"

After Harry had assured Hagrid that he was in fact feeling better than ever, Hagrid seemed to relax, and they talked for a while about Quidditch, the weather, the amount of homework they had and various other inconsequential things. Every now and then Harry glanced at Jenni, who had been keeping pretty quiet, to see if she was all right. She seemed to be fascinated with the contents of Hagrid's hut. Harry saw her staring for a full five minutes at a skein of unicorn tail-hair, and then at a pile of brown stuff that looked to harry like greenish leather. At one point she even turned around in her seat to get a better look at a glass jar with a few mossy twigs inside. She studied this suspiciously for a few moments and then gasped in surprise. Everyone turned to look at her and she blushed slightly, and then said in a shocked tone. "Are those bowtruckles?"

Hagrid nodded and looked impressed. "Yeh, professor Lupin wanted some for a lesson o' his, so got them from the forest." Jenni looked horrified. "But how long have they been there?"

"About a week. I've been feeding 'em regular. A bit o' tree bark and some woodlice and that."

"A week! You can't do that!" Before anyone could take stock of what she was saying, Jenni had strode over to the jar and wrenched off the lid.

"Don't do tha'!" Shouted Hagrid, "Little blighters 'l ruin me house!"

Harry, Ron and Hermione stood rooted to the spot, watching in horror as Jenni scooped out one of the twig like creatures. Harry winced as he saw its long, sharp fingers. What was she letting herself in for? To everyone's surprise however, the bowtruckle opened its amber eyes, took one look at Jenni's glare and sat obediently on the palm of her hand. Everyone in the room let out a sigh of relief. Jenni turned to Hagrid. "Do you mind if I take some of those fairy eggs?" She pointed to a bowl of whitish goo and Hagrid nodded soundlessly, still staring in surprise at the passive bowtruckle.

Jenni dipped her finger into the bowl of fairy eggs and held it out. The other bowtruckles in the jar were watching now, their little flat, wooden faces pressed against the glass. The one in Jenni's hand grasped her finger with its stick-like hands and bit at the fairy eggs with its sharp little teeth. A tiny drop of blood appeared on Jenni's hand, but before she could do anything the bowtruckle had spat a silver glob of spit onto it, which solidified into a grey paste. Ron grimaced. Hermione looked wary but fascinated and Hagrid looked thrilled. "Bowtruckle spit." He murmured " I never knew it could do tha'." He watched as Jenni repeated the procedure with each of the other bowtruckles then magically enlarged their jar and conjured a tiny sapling inside of it. Then she rinsed her hands in the sink and sat back down, looking embarrassed.

"Where d'you learn all that?" he asked, staring at the jar, where the bowtruckles were now buzzing back and forth, polishing the leaves of the tiny plant and making sure that it was angled towards the light.

"My father told me. He loved trees and forests, knew everything there was to know about them. He could identify thirty-seven different species of lichen by taste and he told me once that when he was a boy he tamed a blood-sucking bugbear using only a jar of honey and a radish." A dreamy look had come over her face and Harry was fascinated. It was the first time he had heard Jenni talk of her family since the first day, when she had mentioned that she had a sister named Hermione.

"I think he may have been exaggerating, but he was still a great k-" she corrected herself "a great man. For my fifth birthday he gave me baby acromantula called Mors Mordua." Ron was now staring at her as though she was utterly insane, a thought evidently shared by Hermione. Hagrid on the other hand had a look on his face that suggested he had found his soul-mate. Jenni didn't seem to notice either of them and continued, "I used to ride on her back around the forest where I grew up, but mother said it was too dangerous for a little girl, and took her away from me. Father died soon afterwards. He-"

She seemed to choke and Harry realised with a jolt that a tear was trickling down her cheek. It fell with a splash to the floor and Jenni seemed to suddenly realise what she was doing. She sat bolt upright and the tear vanished, as though it had never been there. "I'm sorry." she said in a perfectly normal tone. "I got a bit carried away." She turned to Hagrid and said "If you need more fairy eggs I you could look in greenhouse two. They have an infestation in the wormwood plants that Professor Sprout was trying to get rid of. I'm sure she'd be happy for you to take the infected plants away."

Hagrid nodded dumbly. Ron's mouth was gaping and Hermione poked him, but she didn't look all that contented herself. Harry was slightly surprised by Jenni's odd behaviour, but mostly he was fascinated. His curiosity had been sparked once more and he was utterly determined to get to the bottom of her strange behaviour, whatever it took.

The sound of the clock in Hagrid's hut chiming five jolted Harry out of his thoughts. Hagrid got up to fetch some rock cakes from the cupboard and they were all settling down to their second cup of tea when suddenly Jenni jumped to her feet, staring at the clock. "Is that clock right?" she gasped. Hagrid shook his head "Nah,'s about half an hour slow. I've been meaning to get it fixed bu-" before he could finish Jenni was already at the door, a look of panic on her face. "I'm-so-sorry-to-rush-off-like-this-but-there's-somewhere-I-have-to-be-I'm-going-to-be-late-thanks-for-the-tea-Hagrid-see-you-three-at-dinner-goodbye." And before they could get up or react in any way, the door had shut behind her. Ron shook his head. "That girl," he said, in the tone of one imparting the answer to great mystery, "Is a complete and total nut-case." Harry frowned. He had thought that before, he supposed, but now… Now he didn't know what to think.

* * *

Reveiws:

embzy: Thank you! *hands out lollipop* The next chapter will be out soon, please keep reading!

:): I'm glad that you liked it. I'll definately keep writing!

Thank you for reading! Please reveiw!


	5. Happy Halloween!

AN: I do not own Harry Potter

Harry, Ron and Hermione left Hagrid's about an hour later, having refused offers of further rock cakes. They strolled through the grounds at a leisurely pace, admiring the way the evening sunlight glinted off the leaves of the forbidden forest. After a while Hermione voiced something that she suspected they had all been thinking.

"Do either of you get the impression that Jenni isn't particularly fond of us?"

Ron grimaced. "She seems to have lost it, if you ask me. I mean, she'd never met Hagrid before and suddenly she's re-arranging his house and telling him what to do. But she's not actually bossy, because she never tells us what to do and when she's with Lavender and Parvati she's practically silent."

Hermione frowned, "I think you're being rather judgemental Ron. I was just suggesting that she might be having problems that she's too scared or worried to tell anyone about. I mean, if you take a physiological viewpoint, her behaviour points more towards insecurity than any actual control issues. Take for instance the work of Mungulus the Mad; he suggested that..."

Ron rolled his eyes at Harry and adjusted a pair of imaginary glasses. Harry snorted, but took one look at Hermione's face and hastily turned the snort into a choke. "Chh...ack...Bit of..shnk..rock cake..uuck..."

Ron grinned. "That's a real good look you've got there, mate. Like a troll with indigestion."

Harry frowned seriously. "Now, now. Let's not be rude about trolls. You might upset Pansy Parkinson."

Ron drew in his breath sharply in mock horror and put on a high falsetto voice, "Now that's really too much Mr. Potter. How DARE you h'insult my daughter in that fashion. Why, the very suggestion!"

Harry put on an expression of disgust, "Your DAUGHTER? Are you telling me that Pansy Parkinson is your _daughter_?" He looked thoughtful for a moment "Well she's certainly inherited your urbane charm and wit."

They both frowned seriously at each other for nearly a minute before Ron couldn't help it any longer and started laughing. "Ha ah ha ah ha ha!- your FACE!- ha ha ah oh dear..."

Hermione pursed her lips into a thin smile as Harry and Ron collapsed onto each other, laughing so hard that they could barely breathe.

* * *

Dinner was really quite enjoyable. Harry and Ron were both in unstoppable good moods and Hermione couldn't help feeling buoyed up by their constant laughter and jokes. By the time that the puddings arrived they weren't even laughing at anything in particular and everyone was staring at the three with looks of concern, as about every five minutes they would all spontaneously burst into peals of laughter. At one point Harry saw Malfoy staring imperiously down at him from the Slytherin table, but he hardly cared. All in all, they were feeling so care-free that none of them noticed that Jenni was nowhere to be seen.

As they made their way through the corridors to the portrait of the fat lady, a miniscule first year girl with long brown plaits and hugely over-sized glasses tugged on Harry's sleeve. "A-a-are you H-Harry Potter?" She squeaked in terror, Harry nodded. "P-professor L-Lupin told me to gi-give this to you." She thrust a small parchment envelope into Harry's hand and then disappeared into the crowd as fast as her legs could carry her. Ron and Hermione leaned in close to Harry as he opened it and read the enclosed letter.

"What does it say?" asked Ron, trying to peer over Harry's shoulder. Harry finished reading and handed it to Ron. "He wants me to come to his office at nine, this evening. Said he's got something important he wants to discuss. Hermione's eyes widened.

"You don't think it's anything to do with You-now-Who, do you?" she said in a whisper.

Harry frowned. "No, I don't think so. I thought he probably wanted to talk about S- I mean my godfather." He spoke in a whisper so quiet that Hermione and Ron could barely hear him. They nodded.

"Probably." Said Ron, sounding relieved.

"Have you heard from him recently?" Asked Hermione.

Harry frowned. "No I haven't, actually. He hasn't sent me a letter in about a month." A look of panic suddenly crossed his face. "God, I hope he's all right."

Hermione thought for a moment and then said. "If something really bad had happened I think that Dumbledore would probably have summoned you straight away. I mean, he's your legal guardian, isn't he? They probably have to let you know about that sort of thing. Lupin said nine, which is about an hour and a half, so it can't be urgent."

"And if the ministry had got him, it would have been all over the papers. I mean, after all that fuss last year Fudge would be thrilled. There's no way he would hush it up."

Harry supposed they were right. Anyway, he would know whatever it was at nine o' clock that evening.

* * *

At ten minutes to nine, Harry left Hermione and Ron in the warmth of the common room while he went to find Lupin. He had the note in his pocket, just in case any teachers wanted to make a fuss about him wandering around the castle at night. He also had his father's invisibility cloak tucked into his pocket, just in case. He descended the stairs to the second floor and walked down the passage past countless classrooms. There, on his left was Flitwick's office. Excellent! He was nearly there. He turned a corner and saw at the end of the passageway the light from McGonagall's office was still burning, casting flickers of fire onto the hard stone floor. He walked towards the light slowly, hoping not to attract the attention of the deputy headmistress and to reach the stairwell next-door to her room without her knowledge. He decided to slip on the invisibility cloak and stick to the shadows on the other side of the passageway, and was just inching past when he heard a familiar voice coming from the doorway of the lit room.

"I'm sorry, professor McGonagall, I'll be more careful next time."

Jenni! That was definitely Jenni's voice and she sounded exhausted. The door was open a crack and if he inched nearer and closed one eye he could see through the gap to the room beyond. He peered cautiously into the office and saw Jenni sitting on a chair facing McGonagall, who had her back to Harry. Madam Pomfrey was sitting on a puffy arm chair between the two, and she seemed to be mixing some sort of potion, a medicine Harry presumed, to give to Jenni. McGonagall spoke again.

"I really don't know why the headmaster didn't inform me of the whole story earlier. He mentioned, of course, that you would be attending the school, but I never would have dreamed..." Her voice trailed off and Jenni blushed a shade of deep crimson that made Harry feel exceedingly awkward. Whatever it was that she was talking to McGonagall about, it couldn't be good. He should go; he would be late for his meeting with Lupin. He was just sneaking off down the passageway when he heard his own name and froze, but it was only Jenni. "Harry Potter is suspicious, professor. I've tried everything but..." suddenly Jenni's eyes flew to the crack in the door. For a split second Harry felt as though she could see right through him, not only past the invisibility cloak, but right into his very soul. She looked him straight in the eye and then opened her mouth to speak. Harry froze. He was sure that she would tell McGonagall that he was there, that he had been eavesdropping. No amount of notes from professor Lupin would save him if McGonagall thought he had been spying on a private meeting. He closed his eyes and then heard Jenni say; "There's an awful draft coming from that door professor. Would you mind if I closed it?"

* * *

When Harry arrived back at the common room about half an hour later, he told Ron and Hermione everything. He told them about seeing Jenni, that he was sure that she had seen him, even with the invisibility cloak. This tugged at Harry's mind the whole evening, but Ron and Hermione seemed more interested in what Lupin had had to say about Sirius. Harry shrugged. "He just wanted to see how I was doing after last year. Said that Sirius hadn't been able to send any letters recently because he was going into deeper cover and had to make sure that no-one knew where he was, but Lupin had talked to him and he was fine. Then a load of stuff about O.W.L preparation and what subjects would I be taking, all that sort of thing. I think he feels guilty about letting Pettigrew escape. I mean," Harry started to get annoyed, going over for the hundredth time what had happened last year. "If he had just taken the stupid potion, Sirius would be free and Pettigrew would be in Azkaban, where he belongs."

Hermione looked concerned. "Now Harry, there's no use in worrying about things that have already happened, there's absolutely nothing you can do about it."

Harry sighed. She was right, really. There was no point in worrying about old battles and losses. He needed to worry about what was happening now. And right now, he needed some sleep. He said goodnight to Hermione and then he and Ron ascended the spiral stairs to the boy's dormitories. Tomorrow was another day after all, and who knew what excitement it might bring...

* * *

What it brought, apparently, was a Jenni who stoutly ignored Harry, Ron and Hermione for the entire day; spending all her time so close to Lavender Brown that at first Harry thought that a backfiring curse had glued them together. Every time Harry came within a six foot radius of Jenni, or tried to speak to her, she would disappear into the crowds of students as though she was made of marsh-gas. After a few of his feeble attempts to follow ended in his stepping on an irate prefects toes, he gave up and resigned himself to the fact that Jenni, for whatever reason, was well and truly pissed off with him.

Harry however was not to be offended so easily, as he was used to people ignoring him, or worse, pointing and staring at his scar. In fact, when he saw the notice on the board advertising the times for the Hogsmeade weekends, Jenni left his mind completely. The first one was tomorrow, and now that he had permission he wouldn't have to worry about sneaking through secret passageways to get there. Moreover, it was the 30th of October today, so they had the Halloween feast to look forward to tomorrow as well! Already there was a huge pile of pumpkins outside of Hagrid's hut, all ready to decorate the great hall and be made into delicious pumpkin pie. It was enough to make anyone forget their troubles, and Harry was certainly no exception.

* * *

Saturday dawned bright and early and Harry, Ron and Hermione were keen to seize the day. They got up unusually promptly for a Saturday and were down at breakfast before most of the other students were even awake. Harry could hardly wait to get out of the castle and see somewhere else for a change, and the hot, stuffy atmosphere of the three broomsticks was just what he needed to take the edge of the winter chill that had begun to creep into the grounds. The leaves of the forbidden forest had turned brown and yellow, and there was a distinct coolness in the air that heralded a particularly harsh winter to come.

They were abut to leave the great hall when the post arrived and to Harry's surprise and some trepidation, Hedwig fluttered down to him with a letter tied to her leg. He took it gingerly and gave the owl a piece of toast, which she nibbled before flying off again. Harry looked at the plain, white envelope. It was unmistakably one of the strange prank letters. Ron suggested that he chuck it out, and Harry was about to, when he saw most of their year leaving the hall and ran to catch up with them, absentmindedly slipping the envelope into his pocket. The three met with the other fourth and fifth year students in the great hall, all of whom were wrapped up in winter cloaks with woolly hats and scarves.

Unsurprisingly, Jenni, Lavender and Parvati avoided Harry and his friends like the plague. Lavender was wearing a rather garish pink cloak, lined with white fur, which allowed Harry to keep the three in sight even from a distance. He was grateful for this, not because he didn't want to talk to Jenni, but at least this way they could avoid any awkward accidental encounters in small shops.

After a brief trip to Zonko's joke shop and a rather lengthier one to Honeyduke's, the three friends retreated to the sanctuary of the three broomsticks, where they set down all their parcels and ordered a large butter beer each. Madam Rosmerta brought these to them and they settled down for a much appreciated rest.

* * *

After they returned from Hogsmeade, none of them felt very much like doing homework. Hermione had already completed most of hers as well as an extra-credit arithmancy essay, and Ron and Harry simply couldn't be bothered to care. They sat on the good sofas nearest to the fire in the common room, eating sweets and chatting about Quidditch and whether there really was a vampire on the successful Transylvanian team, as 'Witch Weekly' claimed. They had a quick lunch of sandwiches and pumpkin juice, not wanting to spoil their appetites for the spectacular feat that evening, then returned to their sofas, from whence they did not budge until seven o' clock when it was nearly time for the feast to start.

Milling around the entrance hall, waiting for the doors to open for dinner, Ron pointed to a small group of fifth and sixth year girls who were wearing dress robes and talking animatedly to some Ravenclaw boys. Harry looked over and saw Lavender brown wearing lilac robes, Parvati at her side in dusky orange. Jenni however was no-where to be seen. Ron nudged him again and pointed to a girl on the other side of the crowd. "Who's she?" He whispered. The girl had her back to them, but Harry could see that she was wearing long pale green robes that were very tight around the waist, tapering out to a full length skirt and embellished with sequins. She had wavy blonde hair, with sections plaited on top of her head with the rest spilling down at the back like a waterfall, almost down to her waist. She reminded Harry of the Elves from 'The Lord of The Rings' a comparison he would have mentioned to Ron if he wasn't sure that it would just cause confusion. As though she could sense Harry's stare the girl turned around and looked him straight in the eye. He could hardly believe it. It was Jenni. He was so surprised that he just stood there, speechless as she brushed past him and went into the hall, Lavender and Parvati at her side and followed by the gaggle of Ravenclaw boys.

* * *

"I can't believe that's actually her." Ron said for the fifth time as they watched Jenni twirling around the dance floor with Lavender Brown. "I mean," He continued, "she's always so damn moody and depressed looking! Then suddenly..."He drifted off and Hermione glared at him.

"I don't see why it's such a shock." She had an almost envious look on her face, "I don't suppose...." She said apprehensively, "that either of you want to dance?"

Harry and Ron both coughed loudly and exchanged incredulous glances. Ever since the feast had ended, the huge tables had been magically pushed to the edges of the room and a band had begun to play, Hermione had been sitting stiffly on the edge of her seat, glaring solidly at the two of them as they showed absolutely no inclination to do anything but sit around drinking pumpkin juice and finishing off generous helpings of sticky toffee pudding.

Ron gestured with a pudding-laden spoon at Draco Malfoy, who was sitting next to Pansy Parkinson at the other end of the hall. Pansy appeared to be attempting to convince Draco to dance with her, but he flatly refused and she stormed off to go and sit with some of the other Slytherins. Ron smirked, "He looks like he's having a great time, doesn't he?" Harry had to admit that Malfoy looked particularly brooding and was staring fixedly into the crowd of dancing couples. Ron stood up and rubbed his hands. "Well, that's cheered me up. Hermione?" He held out a hand for her and she got up, looking distinctly wary. "One dance, okay?" He said, but Hermione beamed and tugged him onto the dance floor so quickly that he nearly lost his footing. Harry just heard Ron's terrified screech of "Maybe this wasn't a good idea..." before they disappeared into the sea of people.

Harry smirked slightly and took another bite of pudding. It was going to be a long evening...

* * *

It was past midnight by the time that Harry, Ron and Hermione left the great hall to head back to the dormitories. Ron was still apologizing to Hermione about nearly dislocating her ankle, but she didn't seem to mind really. Harry was exhausted. Jenni's constant ignoring of him had started to get on his nerves. It wasn't so bad when she was avoiding him, because he didn't have to see her, but after a while Lavender, Parvati and Jenni had come and sat right next to him and Ron, surrounded by the cloud of Ravenclaws. They had started chatting with Hermione and Ron, but Harry didn't feel like joining in. Besides, if he did Jenni would probably bite his head off or something. As it was she was managing to look at both Ron and Hermione, who sat on either side of Harry, without once glancing at Harry himself and making it quite obvious that she was not looking at him on purpose. She had, Harry reflected, the tactical ignoring skills of a boa constrictor faced with a lentil bake. He leaned back and closed his eyes. He had a strange feeling that someone was watching him and opened them to see Jenni staring straight at him. He met her gaze and felt his scar twinge. 'Ow!' he put a hand to his forehead and rubbed it. Ron and Hermione stopped talking and turned to him, looking concerned.

"Are you okay Harry?'

"Is it your scar?'

The Ravenclaws looked on with interest until Parvati and Lavender dragged them off to dance. Jenni stayed where she was.

Harry pushed the hair back from his forehead; his scar was glowing vivid red and was burning as though he had a fever. He poked it gingerly 'ouch!' Ron and Hermione looked concerned, but Jenni's face had gone deathly pale. Her eyes were wide with shock and she was staring open-mouthed at Harry's scar. 'You... you...' she stammered pointing at Harry. This was the last straw. Harry was completely fed up with Jenni hanging around with them all the time and acting weirdly, then suddenly ignoring him for days. He was utterly fed up and he hated it when people stared at his scar, like it stopped him from being human or something. "I think we should move." he said tersely "My scar'll be fine soon I'm sure, but I don't need people staring at me like I'm in a zoo." he got up to move and Ron and Hermione followed him. They went and sat down on chairs at the opposite end of the hall, but as he glanced back Harry could see that Jenni was sitting stock still, staring at him as though she'd seen a ghost.

They reached the portrait hole and scrambled through it, Harry bid goodnight to Hermione and then him and Ron began to ascend the spiral staircase that led to the boy's dormitories. Harry brushed his teeth and changed into his pyjamas, then flopped down onto the bed and drew the curtains around him. He lay back and closed his eyes. He felt bad about yelling at Jenni, but he was just so fed up with her. Why was she suddenly ignoring him? It wasn't like he had done anything really... well actually he had yelled at her a few weeks ago, but at the time she had acted as though nothing had ever happened. Then, he didn't do a thing, and she was furious!

Then there was that weird... something about her. Harry wondered for the hundredth time why she had been in hospital and not been able to start in the first year, if she even had. He thought of Hermione's initial reaction to her unusual talent _"she could be a spy for you-know-who!"_ was that possible? She was certainly talented. But if she was spying on Harry, waiting for her chance, why should she react that way to his scar and draw so much attention to herself with her odd behaviour? No, she couldn't be a spy. But if she wasn't a spy, what was she?

She certainly wasn't a normal student, that Harry was sure of. With these thoughts spinning through his head, he hardly noticed dean and Seamus coming into the dormitory. They were chatting quietly and Harry let their conversation wash over him as he lay in bed, drifting in and out of sleep. Finally an odd sentence caught his attention.

'Malfoy said it wasn't fair that Harry always got all the best-looking girls in the school.' It was Dean, speaking, Harry recognised his voice.

'Yeah, I heard that. Jerk. Anyway, if only he realised what a nutcase she was... then he wouldn't be so keen. I don't think she likes him much anyway, she was dancing with loads of guys.'

'Yeah.'

They lapsed into silence, but Harry's mind was racing. Who were they talking about? Surely not Malfoy and_ Jenni_? But Malfoy _hated_ Gryffindor... why would he like her? And then she didn't like him, did she? Not that he cared or anything, of course.

* * *

Reviews:

Seffi xox: Thank you! I certainly will.

Meh: Thanks for the review, slightly weird but thanks. I think I'm going to stop bugging my friends to review if this is what I get....

Virtual Cookies???: Ah another review from one of my lovely yet annoying friends. *Hands out white-choclate chip cookie* happy now?

Thank you for reading! Please Reveiw!


	6. To the Heights by Narrow Paths

AN: I know that I am awful about updating, and so I have decided to set a deadline that I will write at _least_ two chapters a month, and the fanfic (approx. 16 chapter total) will be completed by the first of July 2010. Meanwhile, please keep reading and reviewing!

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter

* * *

Sunday morning after breakfast found Harry, Ron and Hermione seated in the common room by the fire. There was a large plate of Honeydukes sweets on the table, which the three had been devouring. Harry yawned and reached into his pocket for his wand to summon a piece of fudge and to his surprise he found a large, white envelope. He was about to open it when Hermione suddenly jumped up from the sofa and grabbed it out of his hands. "Wait!"

Ron stared at her in confusion "Hermione, what are you on about? Why can't he open his letter?"

"_Because_," Hermione said in exasperation, "It's one of those prank letters, something you would have noticed if you weren't both half-asleep."

Ron shrugged, "even so, it was just water. I still reckon it was Malfoy's idea of a hilarious prank, sending you an envelope that soaks you when you open it."

Hermione frowned. "We don't know that it was water."

Harry and Ron exchanged puzzled glances.

"Eeerrr... Hermione...It was a see-through liquid, and it didn't _do _anything. what else could it be?"

Harry nodded, "Yeah, I mean if it was acid or something we definitely would have noticed..."

Hermione sighed in exasperation. "Just because you don't think it's done any damage doesn't necessarily mean that it is the case. Take Veritaserum, that looks just like water but it's banned by the ministry."

Ron rolled his eyes. "All right then, we chuck the letter, but I bet you a bag of liquorice wands that it's just water. Sadly however, there's no way of finding out for sure, so-"

"Actually there is." Hermione rummaged around in her bag and drew out a glass test tube sealed with a cork that had a thin tube with a needle on the end coming out of it.

Harry shook his head, "I seriously worry about you Hermione. What _is_ that?"

"A syringe. I was using it in Herbology on Friday and I forgot to put it back."

She placed the envelope on top of a pile of sweet wrappers, poked it with the syringe and then tapped it with her wand. The three students watched in silence as the liquid flowed up through the test-tube. When it was full Hermione tapped the contraption with her wand, sealed the cork and was just about to chuck the envelope into the fire when Harry said, "Hold on a minute, is there or is there not still something in there?"

Hermione shrugged, siphoned the rest of the liquid off with her wand and handed the envelope to Harry, who opened it. There was something there; a piece of paper, folded in half and inexplicably dry.

He unfolded it and saw that someone had scrawled a message on it in red ink that looked uncomfortably like blood. "STAY AWAY FROM JENNI YOUSEI."

He handed it to Ron, who assumed a look of mock terror and then said in a puzzled voice, "But I don't get it Harry, why would anyone, least of all Malfoy, want to send you _that_?"

Harry said nothing but he had a pretty shrewd idea. It was still weird though, and not Malfoy's style at all. If he wanted to say something to Harry, he was sure that Malfoy would be perfectly happy to sneer it at him in the corridors, preferably in front of a large crowd of Slytherins. This was just strange.

"This is serious Harry," Hermione was frowning, "mysterious potions are all very well but if someone's sending you threats you should go to a teacher."

"Well, it's not really a threat, I guess." Harry said, privately thinking that there was no way he was going to show the letter to a teacher. "I'm sure that they're not serious, whoever it is."

Hermione however was no longer listening. She was looking instead at the back of the piece of paper.

"Look at this."

She pointed to the bottom, where the paper had clearly been torn from a notepad. There was a line drawing, in green.

"What is it?"

"Well," Hermione pursed her lips, "I think that it's half of a coat of arms. There's an inscription too, but it's in Latin and I don't know what it means."

Now that she mentioned it harry could see what looked like a tree and some swirly writing.

"ad augusta per angusta." He read. "huh, whoever wrote it must be from some really rich family to have their own headed notepaper."

"Probably a Slytherin, then." Ron yawned "oh, and when you find out what that stuff is, make sure that you get the normal flavour of liquorice wands, the red ones taste funny."

Hermione snorted but Ron ignored her. He leaned back in his chair and put his hands behind his head. "Who cares about the letter anyway. It's Sunday."

He closed his eyes and a dreamy look came over his face. Harry chucked the letter in the fire and Hermione smiled. "You're right, Ron. It's such a good feeling, isn't it, knowing you don't have anything you have to do, or anywhere to go?"

"No rushing off to lessons." Ron said

"No extra quidditch practices." Harry added.

"No more 4ft Transfiguration essay."

Ron and Harry both opened their eyes wide and stared at Hermione.

"What essay?" They said in unison.

"Oh don't worry about it. McGonagall set it ages ago. I only mentioned it because I was finishing it off yesterday; you've probably done it."

Silence

"you haven't have you?"

Harry and Ron slowly shook their heads.

"I was meaning to get around to it." Harry muttered.

"She gave us two weeks to do it..." pleaded Ron.

Hermione sniffed, "well, you had better get started on it because it's due in tomorrow and it took me _ages_."

* * *

Monday morning came far too soon and Harry found himself standing with the rest of the fourth year Gryffindors outside the potions lab, glaring at his timetable as though it had done him some great personal wrong.

Why, oh _why_ did he have potions on a Monday morning? I mean, did anyone think that was a good idea? The sight of Jenni's long blonde hair did nothing to improve Harry's mood. He hadn't said a word to her since the ball on Saturday, but he presumed that she was ignoring him. Whoever had sent that letter needn't have bothered, really. It annoyed him how she seemed to take offence at everything he did.

The sound of Snape's approaching footsteps jerked Harry from his thoughts and into depressed contemplation of the coming lesson.

It turned out that Snape was in an unusually foul mood and he began by dividing the class up into pairs to work on a new and very complex potion. He surveyed Harry and Ron with a look of utter disdain, then said "Potter, you will work with Zabini." Malfoy smirked and Jenni shifted herself towards Lavender. Snape sneered, "Miss. Yousei, you will work with Mr. Malfoy."

Oh well, thought Harry as he turned to glance at the pair, at least I have the look on Malfoy's face to cheer me up. To his surprise however, Malfoy's sneer, although not diminished, was not as annoyed as Harry had expected. Unsurprisingly Jenni looked as though she was going to punch Malfoy again.

Harry was distracted by Snape, who had started scribbling instructions on the board, and Zabini, who had moved to sit next to Harry and was sneering at him. He set to work with only the thought of Defence Against the Dark Arts with Lupin later to stop him for going completely spare.

About half way through the lesson a peal of laughter broke the fevered silence and Harry looked up to see Draco Malfoy with his face and hair dripping with berry juice and Jenni holding a seed pod and almost doubled up with badly-suppressed laughter. There was a moment of stillness while the whole class waited for Draco Malfoy to hex her, or appeal to Snape to take 50 points from Gryffindor. Harry himself was shocked that Jenni had lasted even a second without some horrible fate befalling her, as Snape would never reprimand Malfoy for anything.

To everyone's surprise Malfoy merely raised one of his thin, blonde eyebrows sardonically and said to Jenni "Do you have any tissues?" The rest of the class exhaled and got back to work, but Harry could hardly believe his eyes. Why on earth wasn't Malfoy furious? Harry felt his stomach twist as Jenni managed to stop laughing for long enough to get a packet of tissues out of her bag and hand them to Malfoy, who began to wipe his face. For the rest of the lesson, whenever harry glanced at their table they seemed to be working quite amicably, and the hostility between them appeared to have evaporated almost entirely.

When Snape came around at the end of the lesson to inspect everyone's work he stopped for a long time in front of Draco and Jenni's potion, examining it closely for any flaws. "Good work." He said curtly, "For a Gryffindor. Perhaps you would have been better suited to my house." Draco Malfoy nodded almost imperceptibly, and Harry was hardly surprised when Snape pronounced his and Blaise's potion to be unacceptable. Harry wasn't even listening as Snape set them an essay to write in their pairs, due in a week's time, before dismissing the class.

As they came out of the class Ron craned his neck to see if he could spot Fred and George, who apparently owed him money. Jenni walked past just as he was standing on tip-toes and they collided, causing Jenni to drop the books she was carrying. "Oh, sorry" Ron muttered, leaning down to pick up the books. Before he could however, he was pushed out of the way by Draco Malfoy. "God Weasley," he drawled, "You're so clumsy I wouldn't be surprised if you told me you were related to Goyle." Then he leaned forward and sneered into Ron's ear "Oh, except for the fact that your family are blood traitors." He took a step towards them and for a split second Harry thought that he was going to punch Ron, but he did something so unexpected that Harry could hardly believe his eyes.

He leaned down, scooped up Jenni's books, then turned to her and smiled. Actually _smiled. _"You've got Defence against the dark arts next, haven't you?" He said to her, " I've got charms on the same floor, I can carry these, you've got a hell of a lot of stuff." And, without looking at Ron or Harry he began to walk down the corridor, still carrying Jenni's books. Harry waited for Jenni to go berserk and punch Malfoy for being so patronising, but to his immense surprise she didn't say a word and hurried to catch up with him.

* * *

Defence against the Dark arts came as something of a relief after Harry's stressful morning. He couldn't believe that Jenni and Malfoy were suddenly so chummy. Malfoy was acting completely out of character and as for Jenni; how could she be so gullible as to think that Draco Malfoy was a nice person? It defied belief.

Lupin was, unusually, not giving a practical lesson and they were instead copying down notes on the habitats and qualities of centaurs. It was very interesting, although how harry failed to see how it related to defence. Something to do with their vague connection to thestrals, apparently. Jenni seemed to be particularly knowledgeable on the subject, and answered almost every question that Lupin asked. The rest of the class were quiet, as few knew much about centaur culture or history. Even Hermione had been stumped by some of the more complex questions.

"Now, can anybody tell me why we know so little about centaurs?"

Hermione raised her hand.

"Miss Granger?"

"The main reason why we know so little about centaurs is their disdain for humans and their naturally solitary nature."

Lupin nodded, but Jenni frowned and raised her hand.

"But sir," she began "centaurs aren't naturally solitary at all, and the only reason they distrust humans is because they can see what a mess human's are making of the world, and realise the implications. They're very nice really." She paused, seemed to be aware of something she had missed and then added, "Probably. I wouldn't know."

Harry would have been surprised that Jenni had openly contradicted a teacher, but after that morning he didn't think that anything would surprise him anymore. Lupin merely raised his eyebrows a little and continued to question the class.

"Now, who knows how centaurs relate to our topic, thestrals." No-one raised their hands, and all faces were a picture of quiet bewilderment.

Lupin gazed around the class rather disappointedly. "I'm afraid," He began, "That I'm rather failing to grab the attention of the class, save for a few. I feel that it would be better if I asked you to do some research on the subject for homework and we can work on it in more detail in the next lesson. I would like two pages of notes on centaurs and the creatures that share their environment by Wednesday's lesson please. Once you have packed your books you may go to lunch."

* * *

After they had eaten, Harry, Ron and Hermione went up to the Gryffindor common room to see if they could get a start on some of their homework before the afternoon's lessons.

Harry sat with a large book open on his lap. It was one that Hermione had got out of the library and according to her it had some excellent information about centaurs. Harry had written quite a bit, and noted down the relevant pages, but he couldn't find much about other creatures that shared the centaurs' environment. There were a few notes on rabbits and similar woodland creatures, but that was all he could see. He flicked through to the index and looked up centaurs. There was only one cross-reference: "Dryads/Hamadryads: pg.289"

He found page 289, but was disappointed to see only a single, short paragraph on the subject. It read;

"Dryads and Hamadryads

Very little is known about these creatures, save that the inhabit forests and are protectors of the trees, which they guard most jealously. They are known to be extremely reclusive and thoroughly distrusting of humans. Sightings date as far back as the classical Greek period, but the only wizard known to have researched them extensively was Godred the Gullible (died 1567). He wrote in his final work: 'Dryads; the myth, the mystery and the magic' that 'Dryads are of human shape and height and closely resemble them, save for the wings that grow from their backs and a certain olive tinge to the skin. They are closely related to Hymadryads, which are smaller creatures, with pale green skin that inhabit trees and die with their plant counterparts. Believed by the Greeks to be a minor deity, they are also sometimes incorrectly referred to as wood nymphs. Dryads are unsociable, the only other species they are known to respect are centaurs."

Harry groaned. That was _it? _Boring. Oh well, at least he'd have something to write, be it only a tiny paragraph. He still had no idea what they had to do with thestrals. He shut the book, grabbed the stuff he needed for his next lesson and set off.

* * *

: ): Thank you! Good point about the Lord of The Rings, however I was thinking more of the books than the movies.

Anon: I will update more! I'm so lazy I need to motivate myself TT_TT. I've set a deadline, I know it's not great but it's a start.

Chapters: Very true.

Thank you for reading! Please reveiw!


	7. The Shelf Of Life

AN: I do not own Harry Potter

The defence against the dark arts homework had been tricky enough, but the potions project was _impossible_. The worst part of it was that Harry had to work with Blaise. They had arranged to meet in the library at lunch to start on it but, surprise surprise the Slytherin git hadn't bothered to show up.

Harry was sure that Snape had known this would happen, after all, all the other people in his class were teamed with others from their own house. Oh, apart from Jenni and Malfoy. Unfortunately, their project seemed to be going rather well, and so was Ron and Hermione's, even though it was purely due to that fact that Hermione had done all of the work. She complained about Ron's laziness constantly but at least it meant they wouldn't fail.

After glancing at his watch for about the millionth time, Harry gave up and decided to grab some books, then find Ron and Hermione and go to lunch. He yawned, earning himself a glare from madam Pince and headed towards the potions section of the library. There were too many books, he decided, as he stood in front of the section labelled "advanced potion making and theory", which consisted of fully twenty shelves, each of which was about six foot long and crammed to bursting with books. There was nothing for it, he would have to ask madam Pince.

He was just walking back through the Herbology section towards the library entrance, when he saw Jenni, sitting behind a large pile of books at a table near to window. The sunlight streamed through the glass and illuminated her face and hair so that she looked like an angel. Harry realised that he was staring at her and looked away, but before he could walk off she had looked up from the book she was reading and stared straight at him. Damn. He would have to go over and talk to her now, otherwise she would think he had been creepily staring at her, or that he was ignoring her or something. However if he did talk to her she was bound to tell him to go away. He shook his head. Girls...so _complicated_.

"Hello Jenni, working on your potions project?"

"Yes." She went back to reading her book and Harry hovered awkwardly for a moment, trying to work out if it would be rude to leave now. Jenni looked up at him and frowned slightly, as though he was in the way, then said

"I suppose you want to sit down."

"Umm... is that all right with you?"

Jenni gave a snort of annoyance that made it only too clear that it was not 'all right' at all and then pulled out the chair across from her. Warily, Harry sat down and tried to read the title of Jenni's book.

* * *

Hermione was also in the library and she too was attempting to read the title of a book. This was made somewhat difficult by Ron, who was siting next to her and trying to levitate Berty Botts every flavour beans into the hair of passing first years without them noticing.

Hermione sniffed. "You do realise that if madam Pince catches you with food in the library you will be blacklisted?"

"Say what?"

"You won't be allowed to take books out of the library any more." Hermione clarified.

Ron shrugged. "So what? It's not like I borrow books from here anyway."

Hermione seemed incredibly frustrated. "But what about your OWLs? What if, one day you're in desperate danger and you need to do some research and you come in here to borrow a book on counter-jinxes to fatal spells and you _can't_. Then what'll you be? Nothing but a...a...a..._cobweb_."

"Oh wow. Scary." Ron rolled his eyes, then narrowed them in confusion and said "cobweb?"

"The webs of dust you get in corners of houses that aren't cleaned properly"

"Yeah I know what a cobweb is, but what do you mean I'll be a cobweb?"

"Professor Alexander Albinion, the famous French philosopher said that the world could be broken down into different types of people that corresponded to different items of stationary on a shelf that represents life."

"How is a cobweb a piece of stationary?"

"It's not. In Albinion's model the cobweb is the lowest form of life that clings to the crumbling edifice of civilization but can never return to its former glory. It is doomed to remain hanging there forever, until it is swept away along with scrunched up pieces of paper and old coffee cups."

"Sounds like a total nutter..."

Hermione nodded sagely "Many said so. Especially after the incident with the turnips."

"Oh yeah? What happened?"

"Well, it was summer and-"

She stopped because Ron had turned horribly pale and was staring at something behind her. She turned around very slowly to see madam Pince standing over them, brandishing a box of bookmarks like a mace.

"Mr. Weasley..." She whispered, and Ron had never heard a whisper that sounded so threatening. Hermione shifted one of the books so that it covered the packet of sweets.

"Talking in the library is strictly forbidden. You will leave now. Miss. Granger, I am deeply disappointed in you but will reserve punishment in light of the books that you helped me to catalogue last week."

They both held their breath as Ron stood up and grabbed his bag. He started to move towards the door but madam Pince called him back. "Not before you've returned those books to the correct shelves"

Ron glared and picked up the topmost book. Hermione tried to signal to him to be careful but it was too late. The packet of Bertie Bott's Every Flavour Beans burst open and showered the desk and surrounding floor with a veritable rainbow of sweets. Madam Pince's glare seemed to have increased to such an extent that it could have burned a hole all the way through Ron's head.

"_Food?" _She hissed "_in the LIBRARY?" _Hermione winced and covered her face with her hands. "Detention! And if you so much as set foot in this library again, you will be _very_ sorry indeed." Ron gulped and shuffled slowly out of the door. It was only once he had reached the end of the corridor that he began to run towards the dormitories. God, forget professor McGonagall madam Pince was bloody _terrifying_."

* * *

"So I see Malfoy's not helping much with your project."

Jenni glared at him.

"You're not allowed to talk in the library."

Harry felt vaguely smug at her blatant avoidance of his question and settled back in his chair, wondering what he was going to do about his project.

After about five minutes silent contemplation, tempered with the occasional smug grin, Harry saw Blaise enter the library and look around. Excellent! Harry thought. He must have got the time wrong or got held up in lunch or something. With luck we should have sorted out most of the groundwork in about half an hour.

His feeling of goodwill swiftly evaporated when Malfoy also entered, flanked by Crabbe and Goyle. They began to walk towards the table where Jenni and Harry were sitting and when she noticed them Jenni looked up and smiled politely.

"Working on the project, Jen?" Malfoy asked in his smarmiest, most annoying voice. Harry willed Jenni to tell him off for talking in the library, but he wasn't hopeful.

"I've nearly finished the conclusion. Have you done your half?"

Draco smirked even more and pulled a long roll of parchment out of his bag. "Here you go."

He passed it to Jenni, who slotted it next to the rest of the paper on the table. Harry mentally pulled a face. Draco then turned to Blasie.

"How's your project going?"

Blaise gave Harry a very cold glare and then said, "I have been waiting for some time for Potter to finish the introduction and give it to me so that I can complete the rest."

What? They had never agreed anything of the kind. What a jerk. Harry glared back at him but didn't say anything as he knew it wouldn't help. Malfoy moved to sit down next to Jenni and Harry felt as though he was being suffocated with the Slytherin's smugness. Harry stood up .

"I'll be going then."

"Try and get some work done, would you?" Blaise drawled after him, but Harry ignored him. Arguing with Slytherins he decided, simply wasn't worth the effort.

* * *

When Hermione caught up with Ron in the common room about ten minutes later, he was all set to apologize to her about madam Pince yelling at them, but before e could get a word in edgewise she had pointed her wand at him and shouted "petrificus totalus!"

The common room was silent. Well, marginally quieter anyway, as everyone turned to look at Hermione.

"YOU UNMITIGATED B------" She yelled, her hair fluffing up around her face so that she looked like a lion. "DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA WHAT YOU'VE DONE?"

Ron tried to shake his head, but he couldn't move, so settled for a look of abject terror. While Hermione regained sufficient breath to yell at him again he mentally ran through likely options. Perhaps madam Pince had given her a detention? It was possible... but then why would she be so annoyed, She loved helping in the library? In that case maybe it was something else. Perhaps she had been trying to find a book and madamPince had refused to help her because she was so annoyed. That seemed unnecessarily petty and Ron doubted it.

In fact, he could think of nothing in the world that could possibly account for the look of pure malice on Hermione's face. I mean, she looked like she had been banned from the library or something. Oh god. _Mental rewind. _Banned from the _library_. _Banned _ from the library. He was so dead.

"Thanks to you, I am not allowed to set foot within the library or borrow library books for a _week._"

Most of the common room had by this time turned back to what they were doing, and Ron was left to bear the full brunt of Hermione's anger alone. The small, niggling matter that it was entirely his fault that Hermione had been banned from the library was pushed out of his mind at the sight of her brandishing her wand in his face and screaming.

"A WEEK! Do you have _any_ idea how much time I spend in the library? Do you have even the _faintest_ idea how I manage to maintain perfect grades in almost every subject? Now what am I going to do? Any bright ideas?"

Ron remained silent.

"And what's _more_,"

Oh god there was _more?_ He had thought that this was bad enough...

"You owe me a bag of liquorice wands!"

* * *

Harry hated Malfoy as he had never done before. Why oh why did that guy have to be such an insufferably smug git? And what's more, why did _Jenni_, who had tried to strangle him the first time they met, suddenly become friends with him? What he needed now was a nice, relaxing quidditch practise session to calm his frayed nerves. Luckily, Wood had scheduled one for that very evening at seven, so at least Harry had that to look forward to. He stopped outside the portrait hole to say the password, 'Arcadia' and then stepped through into the common room.

He was looking for Ron and Hermione and to his great surprise he found them almost instantly, as Ron was lying stricken on the ground with Hermione screaming at him. A few people looked at him as he came in and, somewhat embarrassed by his friend's behaviour, he pointed his wand at Ron, muttered the counter-jinx and then gently grabbed the back of Hermione's robes to stop her from punching Ron.

"What the hell is going on?" Harry asked Hermione, who was glaring daggers at Ron.

"_He _was being childish _as usual_ and spilled a load of sweets in the library. Naturally madam Pince was furious. And, even though it was entirely _his_ fault, she's banned me from the library for a _week!"_

Harry turned to Ron or confirmation, but he just looked perplexed. "What do you mean I owe you a bag of liquorice wands?"

Hermione had calmed down somewhat and said, "For the potion that we found in that prank letter. It turns out that I was right, it wasn't water."

It took Harry a moment to work out what she was talking about. When he had remembered he said. "What was it then?"

Hermione settled herself in an armchair and said "It was a mood de-stabiliser. Quite a simple potion, it basically has the opposite effect of a cheering charm. Instead of making the person who takes it happy, it makes them irritable and angry. Purely short term of course, the effects last for up to two hours if the potion's really strong, otherwise it can just last for a few seconds."

Harry frowned. "Are you sure Hermione?" Hermione glared at him and he quickly amended his sentence "I mean, I'm sure that if you say it's that it must be, but why would anyone want to send me that?"

Hermione shrugged. "A stupid prank. Send you a prank letter and just to make sure that you don't ignore it, make you irritable for a few hours so that you brood over it? I don't know. Seems like a lot of trouble for nothing."

Ron had been keeping very quiet, probably in the hope that Hermione wouldn't notice him, but now he spoke.

"Maybe someone thought it was water."

Hermione gave him a look that could have roasted a chicken, complete with potatoes and carrots.

"Not everyone in the world is a stupid as you, Ron. You don't just find potions lying around. What do you think happened? Someone brewed up a cauldron, left it bubbling in the corridor and someone walked past and thought. 'Look! A cauldron of _water?'"_

Harry nodded. "Hermione has a point."

Ron shook his head. "Nah, that's not what I meant. Look, I grew up with Fred and George, and in our house if you leave bottles of suspicious smoking liquids around the house, they get chucked out. Fred and George used to store any stuff they made in muggle water bottles that they got from dad. Once when I was seven I nearly drank an entire litre of sleeping draught that the twins had been planning to give to Percy. Mum went completely mental."

Hermione frowned as though hesitant to listen to anything that Ron had to say. "I suppose someone might have thought that it was water..."

Ron looked immensely cheered by Hermione's apparent consideration of his theory. It seemed as though she had started to forgive him for the whole library thing. Either that or she had been sufficiently distracted by this as to have forgotten. Probably best not to mention anything about it either way, just to be on the safe side.

Harry leaned back in his arm chair and yawned. "Well, I'd better get going, we've got divination next and all my stuff is in the entrance hall."

Ron nodded. "Right. I'll catch you up."

Harry left and Ron was just about to get to his feet when Hermione spoke.

"I'll expect that packet of liquorice wands by Friday then."

Ron gritted his teeth and turned to go.

"Oh, and Ron?"

"Yes?"

"Don't get the red ones, they taste funny."

And with a smug grin befitting of one who has exacted a small but highly justified revenge, Hermione put her feet up on the table and began to read.

* * *

:) : Thank you for reveiwing. I think you have a good point, I'll try to avoid repeating any ooc type dialogue.

Rauni: Thank you! I'm on holiday atm so I should be able to focus on some writing.

AlexTheFork: Do you mean TT_TT ?? It's 2 capital T's then an underscore. I'll do my best to update more!

Thank You For Reading! Please Reveiw!


End file.
